It is often necessary to remove a single component from a gaseous stream so as to clean the gaseous stream, recover the component, or both. Examples of such situations include the upgrading of natural gas, the purification of natural gas before liquefaction, removal of a contaminant from air for breathing, and removal of a high boiling component from air before cryogenic air separation. A widely used method to carry out such component removal is to contact the gaseous stream with adsorbent to transfer the component from the gaseous stream to the adsorbent. Generally the adsorbent is in a fixed or moving bed.
Heretofore, such a single component adsorption has been carried out by passing the component-containing gaseous stream through a single adsorbent bed which is sized accordingly as, for example, is described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,944,627 - Skarstrom. The conventional system has been advantageous because it entails relatively low capital costs and is relatively simple in operation. However, the conventional single component adsorption process uses a large amount of energy, and as energy costs have increased, it is desirable to provide a single component adsorption process which will enable effective removal of a single component from a gaseous stream while employing less energy than heretofore known conventional single component adsorption processes.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide an improved process for the removal by adsorption of a single component from a gaseous stream.
It is a further object of this invention to provide an improved process for the removal by adsorption of a single component from a gaseous stream which is more energy efficient than heretofore known processes.